


no roses for open graves

by eraserheadbaby



Category: Fate/Zero, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms, Fate/stay night (Visual Novel)
Genre: Blood and Gore, F/M, Missing Scene, Relationship Study, Route: Fate (Fate/stay night), Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-11
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:53:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24134632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eraserheadbaby/pseuds/eraserheadbaby
Summary: Rin remembers the first time she ever felt true fear.
Relationships: Kotomine Kirei/Tohsaka Rin
Comments: 3
Kudos: 13





	no roses for open graves

**Author's Note:**

> this is obv a missing scene set before shirou finds rin stabbed in his house in fate route, but i also put it under fz bc its where most of rins and kireis rs background comes from

Rin remembers the first time she ever felt true fear.

Training had been uncharacteristically rough that day, with her unable to carry out even the simplest tasks asked of her. But her teacher never once got angry – no, Kotomine Kirei never got angry. In every lesson, his mask of distance and apathy never got a single crack, only breached by upturns and downturns of his lips that were so devoid of happiness and sadness both they only made him emptier in Rin's eyes.

Utterly vexed, she tried again and again to perform a spell, she doesn't even remember which one exactly anymore but surely it was one she can execute perfectly now. One, two, three tries, and with the forth finally came the breaking point: she started coughing blood. She wasn't a novice, she knew such things happened to overexerting magi, but seeing the blood dirty her own hands was a jolting wake-up call from the security of theories and hypotheticals.

First thing she realized was the tossing and turning of her stomach. Next the shaking of her legs. Finally, and most damningly, the tears pricking the corners of her eyes. When one of them thumped against the wooden floor, she realized she'd been looking down this whole time, and she just had to admit defeat and raise her head to her teacher.

And Kirei smiled.

Not one of his hollow smirks, no, that one was a smile of honest delight; with eyes roaring like dark beads, it was all like a predator ogling its prey before leaping to snap its neck. The shaking of her legs turned into spasms, a tear frozen on the side of her face, her breath stymied in her throat.

Then Kirei simply continued the lesson as if nothing ever happened, explaining the formula one more time with the utmost patience, the utmost detachment.

Nothing was amiss in their next lesson, and the next, and the next, until they all fermented into a cold pattern. Before Rin had realized it, Kotomine Kirei had become a welcome nuisance in her line of vision. When they buried Dad, he was there, when they had to take Mom to yet another clinic, he was there, when she acquired her family's Crest, he was there, when she started high school, he was there.

And that smile was nowhere to be seen.

Maybe the smile was always there and it just escaped her. Maybe she turned her head to it on purpose. Seeing it would scrape the one lasting face out of her picture. Seeing it would rattle this sorry equilibrium she had managed to find, and she would feel like her feet are off the ground again, like she first was when - 

No, Kirei is nothing like Dad, and losing him would never hurt, and definitely never hurt as much. Not to mention he could never reach an ounce of Dad's majesty even if he tried. But being with him was somehow like being with Dad ; as Kirei imparted to her the knowledge that Dad himself gave him, it was like she got to see him again, to spend a little more time with him as she chased the vapor trails of his illusion through Kirei's frigid face.

But if all good things come to an end, that's twice as true for good things that actually never had anything of goodness in them.

That fear was always somewhere inside her, sleeping soundly after that day all those years ago. Today, Kirei awakened it ; for the first time in their shared history, he was the one that sought her out, and he plunged his knives, those blasted Keys she wishes she didn't know, didn't feel inside her as well as she does, deep in her stomach and rooted the fear right up.

Αir flows through the holes on her, and Rin feels exposed. With her fear out of its hiding place, she's nude, deprived even of her blood, which is now canvased on the walls and free for everyone to see. She shuts her eyes, maybe in hopes of being the only one not to see.

The image burns behind her eyelids: He's giving her that smile, enjoying every last drop she bleeds out, every last shiver of her butchered body. 

What does he want from her? She has nothing to give him anymore. He took the fear out of her. She's not afraid of him anymore. Never was. She just had experienced that emotion with him first. Like many others. Like what it feels to have someone to teach you, to guide you, to walk with you down the thorniest paths, even if not as a partner but as a remote beacon. To have someone to turn to, even when you wish you didn't have to.

To have someone to trust.

Rin keeps her eyes closed and she doesn't know if they'll ever open again, and nothing's funny but she wants to burst out in laughter anyway - if she knew her dying thoughts would be about Kotomine Kirei of all people, she would've killed herself before the bastard got to do it.

In the end, though, there's no reason to think about it anymore. The fear, the trust, everything that ever tied her to the Kotomine Kirei she knew, it's all over. What's left is the Kotomine Kirei she met today, who taught her another emotion, the one she's learning now for the first time.

This is the first time Rin feels how it is to be truly betrayed. If she's still alive tomorrow, she wishes she'll have already forgotten what it feels like.


End file.
